Dec. 31, 2010 - PRLog -- Stonyfield Farm joins the ranks of such companies as IBM and Clifbar as successful companies who are giving big. Will Marre, CEO of Realeadership Alliance and author of Save the World and Still Be Home For Dinner (Capital Books), is spotlighting a list of 25 top companies in a series called Giving is Winning who are integrating social responsibility into their core business strategy (see http://www.willmarre.com/blog).

According to Marre, giving and winning go together. “The companies on the list are making industry leading profits and growing at a healthy clip,” he contends. “When giving becomes an essential part of your culture, employees are inspired to create more value and consumers choose you.”

Marre’s list of Giving is Winning companies stems from his extensive research being conducted with Clemson University and the University of California San Diego on what successful companies are doing in today’s challenging environment that average companies are not. Through data research, executive interviews and in-the-trenches client projects with many of today’s thriving companies, Marre, is on a mission to show how successful companies like Stonyfield Farm are becoming unbeatable through strategies that are good for the community as well as the wallet.

Stonyfield Farm, contends Marre, is a pioneer of socially responsible business with a purpose bigger than quarterly results. Some of their initiatives include no chemicals, sustainable farming in which their products are organic focusing on the health of the cattle, employees and customers and donating 10 percent of profits to environmental causes. In addition, Stonyfield Farm built the largest solar photovoltaic array in New Hampshire that has saved the company more than $1.7 million in energy costs over the past six years.

Gary Hirshberg says the secret to his company's success is a blend of altruism and thinking differently. In an Inc. article, Pioneers, he states, "Back when we started the company and we talked about organic farming or decreasing our climatic footprint, we were largely dismissed. Now we know that green means green, there's real money to be made."

Hirshberg sums up his philosophy: "Running a green business is not just an ethically and environmentally responsible activity, it is the basis for economic growth in the 21st century."

Will Marre is CEO of Realeadership Alliance and founder of Thought Rocket, a new online leadership development platform providing up-to-the-minute leadership research on what successful organizations are doing to thrive in the 21st century. Will Marre is also the cofounder of the Covey Leadership Center where he brought the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People to millions of executives and managers worldwide. He also heads the advisory board of the Human Performance Institute (a Johnson & Johnson company) and is an Emmy award-winning writer of a public television learning documentary. For more information please visit http://www.willmarre.com.